Is the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) considered as a real danger? I do agree that I have posed an unconventional, surprising, and doubt-causing question.

Although the answer to this question is not negative, a positive answer would not also accurately suit it. It all depends on the angle we approach this question. When its military and operational power is delved into, an analysis of its power and influence on regional and international development would not lead us to a common perspective on the objectives of the terrorist group.

Indeed, having such criteria in mind, not only the political grounds, but also the ideological demands and the legitimacy of the social and religious groups, which have been targeted by ISIL, would be blatantly violated.

Let us be a bit more realistic. This disregard for the ideological beliefs of ISIL could be the result of two factors. It is either upon a decision by the ISIL leaders, who have been making religious and political investments in the social forces, away from the attention of the international community, while discretely diverting the attention of the international community to their military operations in Iraq, Syria, and other parts of the Western Middle East region. Or else, it could be the result of the leniency of their greatest supporters, Washington’s Arab allies in the Middle East region, in whose countries ISIL has been able to establish and revive its religious legitimacy in order to export it to other parts of the world.

“Confronting ISIL’s international ideology, which has been functioning as its running engine and legitimacy creating machine, would potentially put us against the traditional social and religious structure of our allies in the region. The issue is not merely limited in closing aid routes to ISIL. Rather, the main issue is the existence of certain beliefs in their general structure,” said a high-ranking Western diplomat residing in Riyadh, who spoke on the condition of the anonymity, whose country maintains close and strategic relations with Saudi Arabia.

As long as the issues happening so far are considered, ISIL might be a destructive and endangering force against international peace and security and it certainly is. Yet despite the fear it has developed within the international community, world nations have failed to reach a common security and strategic understanding on a serious campaign against ISIL. As ridiculous as it may sound, thus, the danger of ISIL has resulted not in unity, but rather in disunity at the international scene.

Indeed, ISIL commanders might have a better understanding of the international community and the critical situation of the world, I presume. However, with their so-called religious motivations and making use of world crises and social suppressions, and away from the eyes and attention of the international community, ISIL leaders are training forces and brainwashing people in order to justify the “holy violence”, not only among the youth, but also among children and adolescents of 7-15 years of age throughout the world. They are doing this while at the same time diverting the attention of world to their atrocities in the Middle East region.

Still, the bitter fact is that we in Iran, as the Persian proverb states “the fire is always lit on the neighbor’s house”, have been ignorant of the potential emergence of this ideology in our country.

In a recently revealed and astonishing piece of news, the CNN and BBC reported last week of the hidden ISIL training camps in unknown locations in Indonesia and Singapore. It showed how under 15-year old children, who spoke in Malay language, were under extensive and unconventional religious and military trainings; including one-on-one battles, beheading, setting fire, and vicious execution styles.

“Being a man is not merely being a male creature,” said an 18-year-old boy in the report who was being trained to perform inhumane and terrorist actions in the camp. “A man must learn how to take up arms, fight, kill, and be killed,” he added.

As shown, beheading films were played for kids under the age of 14, and the children were starting to become happy with what they saw.

It might not be much worrying at a first look that training these kids for wars in the Middle East is a dangerous phenomenon, as ISIL is not faced with shortage of fighters in the Middle East region and the fact that these kids are not still properly ready to function in war scenes. Besides, moving them to the Middle East to attend wars is costly and dangerous. Logically, therefore, the objective is future recruitment.

In an exposed piece of information, Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong revealed on June 11 that the country’s security forces have arrested two 17-year-old kids who were planning to assassinate the country’s officials in case they did not succeed to join ISIL in the Middle East.

“Southeast Asia is a key recruitment center for ISIL,” the prime minister said at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore. He noted that this included more than 500 Indonesians and dozens of Malaysians. “ISIL has so many Indonesian and Malaysia fighters that they form a unit by themselves -- the Katibah Nusantara -- Malay Archipelago Combat Unit,” he added.

Several groups in Southeast Asia have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, including Indonesia-based Jemaah Islamiyah, whose leader, Abu Bakar Bashir, announced his allegiance from his prison cell last year, Hsien Loong said.

All the indicators foresee that the battle against ISIL would continue in the Middle East. However, the bitter event would soon turn into a battle against ISIL from Eastern Asia to Western Middle East. The most painful part of this dire phenomenon, however, is the collapse of the unity of the international policies in the face of terrorism and against the ISIL as an ideology.

MD/PA